Putting Humpty Dumpty Back Together
by McLeodHunter
Summary: It's only been about a month or so since Sherlock took the plunge, staying long enough to see John mourning at the empty grave, before he made himself scarce. The brilliant mind pained and grieving, he hid himself in the U.S., and the bottom of a bottle when he could. Jess is a typical loner, quiet, keeps to herself and tries to keep her nose clean, and odds aren't looking so good.


Hello there, if you're reading this, great! It's my attempt at a return to here. Note this is set in the in-between, the whole time our lovely Sherlock is 'dead', and it's all about what happens to him, where he goes etc. We kinda knew he was going to come back, and in this, well he may not come back all too alone. Not sure yet, I try not to plan out my endings unless they slap me upside the head, which has been known to happen. This chapter is more or less the 'Pilot' to see if there is any remote interest, but either way I'll probably keep going on this one. So now onto the disclaimer, I do not own Sherlock, Benedict Cumberbatch (though Lord know's I'd like to no? ;) ) or anything else other than the idea. It all belongs, like my sanity, to Moffat & Gatiss, the producers and BBC etc. So, enjoy and please review, I love those!

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It was your typical Friday night, fending off the drunken and desperate while I tried to keep the place clean. I was closing up tonight, which was bad enough, but I did not want to close and clean the whole place, so I try to keep it up as I go along. There was nothing really out of the ordinary, except for the guy sitting in the corner, standoffish didn't even begin to cover the vibe coming from this guy, a deerstalker pulled down over his face, and a long coat, even though with the ambiance it was hot in the small pub that night, and nursing his whiskey. Well at least he picked a good drink, I couldn't focus on him though, too much other crap to do. Sometime around midnight I saw him leave, didn't think anything of it, he'd paid already so no skin off my nose.

It was around three in the morning before I was able to get the last wasted sod out of the bar and into the cab. I tagged and bagged the various keys that were left behind and put the rest of the stuff in our lost and found. About another half-hour later before I locked up and took out the trash, I'd turned and was heading out towards my bike, a Harley that had belonged to my grandfather, when I tripped over something big and soft. Cursing I rolled around to see what I'd fallen over to find the same guy from earlier. The hell? Had he been out here the whole time? I moved closer and checked for a pulse, it was quick but strong, he'd probably just passed out. I shook his shoulder gently,

"Hey mister, wake up, do you need me to call someone?" I asked, frowning slightly, watching as he came to, not prepared for his next reaction though as he jerked and twisted and I found myself pinned under tall, pale, overcoat guy, with his hand around my neck. So apparently he wasn't the quiet pansy he looked, but he was about to be in a world of hurt if he didn't get up off of me in the next few minutes. I kept my voice controlled, reasonable as I spoke up, "All right mister, get up nice and easy or you're going to be limping home for the next week." He seemed confused, like my words didn't register, or at least not in whatever context he was going over in his head. I saw when something clicked in his eyes, and damn but this man had the hottest, most beautiful eyes I'd ever seen, blue-gray, or perhaps green? God I could just feel myself getting drawn into those eyes, and felt them analyzing me in about the time frame of thirty seconds before he groaned and fell over, passed out again.

Well so much for a moment, I sighed and pushed his dead weight off of me, good thing I actually worked out, otherwise neither one of us was going anywhere that night. I left him lying in the parking lot for a few minutes while I went to stash my bike, last thing I needed was to get busted for planting some dumbshit for touching my bike. That done I went back and hauled him up, arm over my shoulder and started dragging. No idea why I didn't just call the cops, I had every reason to, except that they and I weren't quite on speaking terms at the moment, apparently it is frowned upon to key a detective's sons' car for being an asshat, but as he'd also caused property damage, it'd been more or less squared off, the small town knew me and my history, so I don't get harassed much.

By the time I got him back to my place, which isn't far incidentally, about twenty minutes on my bike, but considerably longer when walking and half-carrying a guy that had at least a foot on me, if not more, it was close to four thirty in the morning. I dropped his butt on the couch with a grunt and stretched as my cat, this gruff, green-grayish mass of fur and teeth came around the corner to leap up onto his perch to greet me. Troll was definitely one of those cats that only a mother could love. He had some Maine coon in him, or maybe it was some sort of dog, because he is massive for a cat, almost thirty pounds and in perfect health. To be fair I think he lost about ten of that when I shaved him down, the thick, long fur was soft as silk, and had an odd mixture of straight, wavy and straight up curly fur, he had a semi-docked tail, like someone had cut it off or something half-way down, his front paws were Hemingway, and his big box head was something else entirely. He had a nearly perfect square-shaped head with one normal ear, and the other folded, with a smashed face and under bite, big doll eyes that were squash-yellow in color. He was without a doubt the Frankenstein of cats, the ugliest little bastard around, and I don't know what I'd do without him.

He'd found me as a kitten, when I'd ran away from home, and ever since then we'd been inseparable. I smiled and picked him up for a big furry hug and felt his purring rumble through me. I kissed his flat nose and set him down to pull some blankets and a pillow from the closet for the unexpected guest, once I'd made him more or less comfortable I headed to the back of my small trailer and collapsed on the bed. I lay there for a moment, almost off to sleep when Troll hopped up on the bed and climbed over me. I groaned into the covers and wriggled around until I had wrangled off my clothes into a pile on the floor then inch-wormed my way up to the head of the bed and pulled my cat close and that was the last thing I remembered before I dozed off.


End file.
